For weeks, Nathan believed Vanessa was carrying his child.

Chapter 12: The Flight Risk

The heavy glass doors of the Miller Logistics building didn't just close behind Vanessa; they sealed her fate. She burst onto the scorching Chicago pavement, the midday sun momentarily blinding her. Her heart hammered against her ribs like a trapped bird, and her lungs burned as she forced herself to breathe. She was no longer Valerie Vance, the brilliant grifter. She was prey.

She practically threw herself into the back of a passing yellow taxi, slamming the door before the driver even fully stopped.

"Drive," she gasped, sinking low into the cracked leather seat so she couldn't be seen from the street.

"Where to, lady?" the driver asked, eyeing her suspiciously in the rearview mirror.

"Union Station," she ordered, her voice trembling slightly before she forced it into a hard, commanding tone. "Take Lower Wacker Drive. Keep out of the traffic."

As the cab plunged into the subterranean gloom of Lower Wacker, Vanessa pulled out her sleek, expensive smartphone. She didn't bother checking her bank accounts. If Thorne had flipped, the feds had already frozen the Cayman shell company and her local checking accounts. She rolled down the window just a crack, snapped the smartphone perfectly in half with a sharp crack of glass and plastic, and tossed the pieces onto the concrete pillars passing by in a blur.

A professional grifter always expects the house of cards to fall. She just hadn't expected it to collapse this violently, this quickly.

She arrived at Union Station, blending into the massive sea of commuters and tourists. Her St. John knit dress, which had felt like armor hours ago, now felt like a neon sign pointing straight to her. She navigated the crowded concourse, her eyes darting nervously, assessing every police officer and transit security guard.

Deep in the bowels of the station, past the ticketing booths, was a bank of long-term rental lockers. Vanessa walked up to locker 402. She didn't have a key; it used a biometric thumbprint scanner she had set up three years ago under a fake name. She pressed her trembling thumb against the glass reader. The tiny light blinked green, and the metal door popped open with a heavy clack.

Inside sat a nondescript, scuffed canvas duffel bag.

Vanessa grabbed it and immediately headed for the women's restroom. She locked herself in a handicap stall and unzipped the bag. This was her "bug-out" kit, funded by her previous, successful cons. Inside were three banded stacks of hundred-dollar bills—thirty thousand dollars in untraceable cash. There was a prepaid burner phone, a dark brunette wig, and most importantly, a Canadian passport bearing her photo but the name "Chloe Bennett."

With frantic, jerky movements, she stripped off the gray dress. She pulled on the contents of the bag: a pair of loose-fitting designer sweatpants, a black oversized hoodie, and a pair of dark sunglasses. She tucked her blonde hair tightly into a wig cap and pulled the high-quality brunette wig over her head, adjusting it until it looked completely natural.

She looked in the scratched mirror of the restroom. Valerie Vance was gone. The pregnant mistress of Nathan Miller was dead. Chloe Bennett, a wealthy Canadian tourist heading home, stared back at her.

She exited the bathroom, the canvas duffel slung over her shoulder, feeling a renewed surge of dangerous confidence. Ethan thought he had outsmarted her. Nathan thought he had ruined her. But she had thirty thousand in cash and a clean identity.